Only Ten More Minutes
by KaleidoscopeKreation
Summary: I'm sorry. All of her vital organs are failing. She has a great deal of internal bleeding. Her heart is going to give out, and there's nothing more we can do.


Only ten more minutes.

_No..._

'No...'

I'm sorry. But her all her major organs have malfunctioned, and she has a great internal bleeding. Her heart is going to give out, and there's nothing more we can do.

_It can't be... _

'I can't believe it.'

I'm sorry.

'It's not your fault.'_ It's mine. _

'You may go inside, if you wish.'

'thank you.'

_Agony. _

A door swinging open.

A chair, pulled roughly away from a beside, and collapsed in. A faintly bleeping life-support, a barely changing line. Sunlight shining through a window.

Red hair, splayed across a pillow. A face that everyone loved, still, pale.

All that, fragmented by tears, as though seen by someone drowning.

_I never meant... I'm sorry..._

_How did it happen like __**this**__?!_

_I'm a..._

_... it might have been an accident. _

It wasn't.

* * *

'Ichigo, how could you!'

'I'm sorry, Lettuce, I really am...'

'Like HELL you're sorry! I saw you kiss him!'

'I forgot – I just thought... you know he's always liked me, Lettuce – '

'You WHORE!' the word tastes strange in my mouth. I've never said this aloud before. I've never spoken to anyone in this way, just to hurt them, to _know _I'm hurting them and relish it and wish I could hurt them more. 'Because you broke up with your _fucking _boyfriend because he couldn't stand you! Because you _can't live_ _a day _without seducing some hapless fanboy who's head-over-heels for you because you act so _fucking _cute!'

'I didn't - '

'You KNOW that we're together! He asked me out after you refused him for the millionth time! And now you'll have him... and _now _you're sorry. Do you know how it feels to be second best, Ichigo? Have you EVER thought of how that feels? For Kisshu, maybe, or Ryou? For _me?_'

'Lettuce...' she's faltering, the words registering, and I can see the affected shock and shallow hurt growing in her babyish, brown eyes. Her hand goes to her mouth, her polished nails glinting in the afternoon sun. She staggers back, clumsily cute in her shorts and sandals and choker and bunches.

Ichigo has always known exactly who she is. I never have. She knows, and she exploits it. She has confidence. I am the least confident person I know. She isn't kind. I try to be. She breaks hearts, and acts like she wishes she didn't. I've never had even my offered heart taken. She has everything I want.

At any other time, I would be able to pretend it was some other way. Maybe I would be right. But now, the cynic's truth, the paranoid clarity of a heart shattering is making me see it this way. And I wonder I didn't see this before.

I've known it since that day by the pool. I've known it since the time I first bumped into her down an alley.

Now, with tears streaming down my cheeks, I'm telling her. Telling her with my eyes, my body, my language.

'Just go away, Ichigo. Just go. I never want to see you again. Get out of my life, and take Ryou with you.

'I'm going to be the one who moves. If you have the tiniest scrap of decency left, you would. But, _Ichigo-san, _I don't expect you to. I hope you have a good life, seeing as you've...' I search for a word that's strong enough. '...killed me.'

And then she does the last thing I expected.

She staggers back. She takes one step, and then another away from me, retreating, _surrendering. _And for one golden moment, a fierce, sinful joy fills me. This is why Adam took the apple. Because this feels so amazing. I hold power, there in my hand, over the one person who has everything I want.

Ichigo's still moving backwards. In another moment, she'll have to turn around, to run away properly. Her eyes are fixed on me, as though she senses my transformation, and she pays no attention to the road behind her.

And then I see it. But I already know it's a moment too late.

'_ICHIGO!_'

My anger has disappeared, evaporated into pure horror. Her shoe is over the kerb, and she's toppling, overbalancing.

She falls.

I run. I run as hard as I ever have, regret, horror, and the sick certainty of what is about to happen in my soul.

'_No – '_

The speeding car brakes. But not soon enough.

Ichigo realises. But a not quite in time.

She screams, her voice just audible over the squeal of rubber on tarmac. 'RETAS – '

Impact.

* * *

Two minutes.

'Do her parents know?' _I've ruined their lives. _

They've been informed, but they won't get here in time.

_There is no proof it was me. The driver saw me, horrorstruck, several yards away from Ichigo. He thinks I was trying to warn her. I was. _

_But that doesn't mean it's not me. This was my fault. Mine and hers. _

'Ichigo?' _Ichigo._

'I'm so sorry.' _Two lives are destroyed. I guess it's fair. _

_No. "Two wrongs don't make a right."_

_I should have forgiven her..._

_... "a word is not a bird. Once freed, it cannot be caught."_

'I'll tell them what happened.' _Everything. _

'You don't deserve to die...' _any more than I do. _

_I'm not going to mend. At least you'll have rest. I will live with this every day, for perhaps sixty years, maybe less, probably more. _

Any moment now. At least she has one person with her.

'Yes.'

_Two girls will die today. _

_I'm keeping her company. We killed each other. _

'Ichigo.'

_Lettuce. _

_No more words now. Just feelings. _

A ray of light through a high window. A cold hospital chair. Two girls, feeling life slip away.

_Beep..._

_Beep..._

_Beep..._

_Beep..._

_... ..._


End file.
